China scholar sees 'symbolism' in killing of foreigner

By Mark Zeigler

UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER

August 14, 2008

BEIJING – The ancient Drum Tower, or Gulou, rises majestically from a gray sea of crumbling brick homes and meandering alleys in central Beijing. It was built in the 13th century and sits on the sacred north-south axis of the city, or dragon line. Giant drums were once sounded from the 153-foot-tall red and green tower so residents could tell time.

Todd Bachman and his tour group probably learned this from their English-speaking guide Saturday afternoon shortly before a Chinese man fatally stabbedhim.

Bachman's wife, Barbara, also was stabbed when, family members said, she went to her husband's aid. Barbara Bachman remains in a Beijing hospital, in serious but stable condition following eight hours of surgery.

The assailant, identified as Tang Yongming of Hangzhou, is dead. He leapt from the second level of the Drum Tower, about 13 stories up.

The past few days have been a blur for U.S. men's volleyball coach Hugh McCutcheon and his wife, Elisabeth, whose parents are Todd and Barbara Bachman. The U.S. men have played and won their first two Olympic matches without McCutcheon on the bench, and there is some question if he will return at all before the Games end. There is a funeral to plan in Minnesota, and Barbara Bachman must be transported home.

But in the swirl of grief and shock enveloping McCutcheon and the entire U.S. Olympic delegation in Beijing, one question hangs in the air like the humidity that bakes the city in the summer: Why?

The U.S. Embassy in Beijing issued a statement saying Tang's attack “appears to be an isolated act” and “we have no reason to believe the assailant targeted the victims as American citizens.” It issued no travel alert for Beijing.

McCutcheon, speaking to reporters for the first time Tuesday, said: “Random acts of violence are random acts of violence. There's no indication here of any premeditation or anything. It seems, just unfortunately, a case of the wrong place at the wrong time. Certainly in our opinion that is the way it appears to be.”

Yet some China experts are cautioning that, while Tang's attack may have been triggered by mental illness or deep depression, killing a foreigner at the Drum Tower may not be quite as random as Chinese and American authorities are portraying it.

“Drum Tower, suicide, knife, foreigners,” said Susan Brownell, a Fulbright senior researcher in Beijing who wrote a book about the meaning of the Olympics to China. “There's definitely some symbolism there. What it meant to him in his own mind is a little hard to figure out. But you've got a failure in life who maybe is trying to redeem himself with what he perceives as the noble act of killing a foreigner, of protecting China.”

The Bachmans were not wearing anything that would identify them as Americans other than perhaps a USA Volleyball pin, U.S. Olympic Committee officials said. But in a city of 17.4 million people, nearly all of them Chinese, Westerners are easy to identify, and one place they are likely to be found is the Drum Tower.

“I think it's a minority but I think it exists,” Brownell said of anti-foreigner sentiment in China. “It's a product of all the rhetoric of China's humiliation at the hands of the West. There is a deep-seated xenophobia that has been an integral part of China for centuries, to close down and shut off to the rest of the world. It's still there today, to a certain extent.”

The Drum Tower was renamed the Tower of Realizing Shamefulness in 1924, serving as a museum devoted to invasions and occupations by foreign nations. It once served as a watch tower on the northern edge of the city, able to alert residents of unwelcome visitors. It has since been converted to a tourist attraction.

There is also the notion of suicide carrying a different meaning in China than in the West, as an act of protest. The popular annual Dragon Boat festival commemorates the death of Qu Yuan, a poet from 300 B.C. who drowned himself as a final, heroic act of defiance against a repressive government.

Locals speak of the increasing number of people from the countryside who move to Beijing in search of a better life and, if they don't find it, quickly become disillusioned. A 2004 report by the Beijing Suicide Research and Prevention Center named suicide as the fifth leading cause of death in China and No. 1 among people between the ages of 15 and 34.

Chinese authorities said Tang was a troubled 47-year-old man from the eastern province of Zhejiang. He reportedly had lost his job at a factory in Hangzhou, had gone through a divorce and was living in a rented room in Beijing.

“It happens all the time,” said a European language teacher who has lived in Beijing for a decade and who declined to give his name. “Someone loses everything. They lose their job, they get divorced, they kill themselves. It happens so often here that no one notices anymore.

“But if a foreigner gets killed, it's different.”

Few details have surfaced in the days after the attack. Authorities continue to insist it was a random, isolated attack, but they also admit it is still “under investigation.”

The plaza behind the Drum Tower has returned to normal, with families playing badminton and shirtless men playing cards in the sultry evenings. The Drum Tower remains locked, though. A small, yellow sign above the ticket window says “Temporarily Closed” in English and Mandarin.

Xinhua, China's state-run news service, first reported the attack on its Web site. Beijing newspapers and television stations have carried little, if any, mention of the story.

“They are worried you'll have copycats,” said an official from a Chinese governmental agency, speaking on the condition of anonymity for fear of losing his job. “You have how many people who are destitute and disenfranchised in a city this large? (Publicizing the incident) might empower someone to do it again.

“And if it happens again, you will have a mass exodus to the airport by foreigners.”

Many family members of U.S. volleyball players were scheduled to arrive this week, in time to see the last few games of pool play and the ensuing medal round. All are still expected to make the trip. The USOC, taking its lead from the embassy, has issued no additional safety precautions.

“There was a point where I didn't want them to come,” said U.S. volleyball team member David Lee, a Granite Hills High alum whose girlfriend, parents and older brother flew in yesterday. “But they really wanted to come. They said, 'We're not going to miss this.' They said, 'This could happen anywhere. It could happen in San Diego.'

“But I had to make sure that, in my mind, there was no harm that could come to them.”